


My Own Company

by autisticcloudstrife



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Gen, Oneshot, number prompt, possible moirallegence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-23
Updated: 2012-04-23
Packaged: 2017-11-04 04:24:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/389711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/autisticcloudstrife/pseuds/autisticcloudstrife
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(number prompt: 11 and 2 are best friends, and they find a stray dog that seems to be hurt. What do they do?)</p>
<p>It's lonely out in the Dream Bubbles sometimes. But that's not necessarily a bad thing.<br/>Friendship is born under the strangest circumstances.<br/>And despite the differences, there's often something in common somewhere.</p>
<p>(oneshot)</p>
            </blockquote>





	My Own Company

Getting used to life in the Dream Bubbles was a bit of a rocky road for the Cancer, right from the start. In this particular timeline he'd already literally passed through one or two of them, and spent days upon days upon days dreaming through them. He was thoroughly sick of them.

(Wait, were they days or nights? And more importantly, did it matter in Paradox Space, where there was no time to pass _anyway_? He didn't really give two shits _either_ way.)

Karkat had encountered several other selves along his personal journey through the afterlife, as well. That was something he really could have done without. They were assholes, every single one of them, and all scorned him for _his_ particular timeline lasting longer than theirs (and he really couldn't blame them, because he would have done the exact same thing in their positions).

Well, at least they did until they remembered that somewhere along the line, they realised that it didn't matter in the long run anyway. Shoot-off timelines were certainly not treated kindly by Paradox Space, especially those that were never supposed to exist in the first place. The damn universe (or really, the space around it) had its own special, secret way of running things like a fucking Mafia boss, except it didn't lay down any ground rules at all and if you didn't fit the criteria it fucked you royally in the ass.

Without lube.

But the longer he'd spent here, the better he'd become and passing through from one bubble to the other without getting lost in the endless voids, or losing what precious little remained of his mind. This sort of thing was much better left to Dersite dreamers, whom had at least some sort of experience with this bullshit, but beggars couldn't be choosers.

Phasing between bubbles was no pleasant experience by any means, but once his feet found solid ground again (his mind tended to wander while he travelled, because hell if he wanted to hear that horrible static chattering in the spaces between existance- shit, this place was beginning to get to him. Even his _thoughts_ were becoming overly-prosy and poetic bullshit) he continued walking along, casting a wary eye around.

He liked it here in this Dream Bubble, when he could find the damn thing. He recognised the dark, starless skies and the twin moons hanging perpetually right above him, never moving, and no time ever passing. The black and purple landscape was comforting, even if it did pull at the threads of his heartsac a little unpleasantly, and even the lapping of the ever-dangerous ocean was nice.

It was home.

Karkat flattened his ears back against his skull as he thought, skinny shoulders hunching up and his hands curling into fists with dark orange claws digging uncomfortably into leathery palms. He grit his teeth as he kept forward, forcing one step after the other as he folded his arms around his midsection.

He wanted nothing more than to just kneel down on the muddy bank or in the damp sand and just- let everything out. He'd done that the first time he'd found this bubble, and it had been absolutely freeing. It didn't even matter that some things weren't the same (he'd come across some structures that had been knocked down long before he'd hatched, and some were missing that he'd grown to recognise, especially around his own lawnring), what mattered was that it was Alternia and it was the closest thing to home he'd found since the start of that _fucking_ game.

He tried not to think about that anymore.

But he couldn't stop, not even for a couple of minutes. Otherwise he'd never find that asshole he'd come here looking for, and then where would he be?

Speaking of assholes, his ears flicked back up as he felt a hand come down lightly on his shoulder. He flicked his eyes to the side before following the motion with his head, slits of pupils growing wide as he caught sight of the figure behind him.

"The fuck are you doing all the way out here?" he questioned quietly, tilting his head a little and raising an eyebrow. Karkat shrugged his hand off and turned to face him entirely, having to tilt his head back to catch his eyes.

It had been _unnerving_ the first time they'd met; short horns poking out of wiry, black hair; short and skinny, wrapped in a tattered cloak and a pair of ridiculous, red-trimmed leggings; wide, tired eyes with irises shining that bright, odd, _disgusting_ candy red.

Of course, there were some differences- the Signless was a lot softer spoken than Karkat himself, voice raspy and almost passive. He'd been angry about it at first (then again, directly after his _death_ , what _wasn't_ Karkat angry about?) but he'd grown to almost enjoy it, even if he needed to ask for the older troll to speak up occasionally.

"There's shit all to do out in more than half of these dead sacs of wasted potential, you tool," he growled back, narrowing his eyes and baring sharp fangs. "Thought you might appreciate my gracing your shithole of an afterlife is all."

His ancestor bared the same fangs back, yellowed with age and one or two broken. After a bit of small talk the pair of them finally agreed to go on a little walk together, away from the (unusually calm) ocean.

(The ocean was always calm here, and it lacked Gamzee's hive sitting precariously close to the edge of the shore, which was kind of weird and inaccurate. But it was okay.)

They weaved between abandoned highblood hives, tall and wide and completely empty. Wind whistled through the broken windows and played them almost like ocarinas- Karkat drew closer and the Signless wrapped an arm around him, sheltering him with the tattered remains of his cloak despite both of them knowing full well there was nothing to be scared of.

Fear, on a personal level, was something that the tolerant sufferer was no longer familiar with. Sympathy for others, however, was something that still burned strong within his long-dead body.

The magnificent hives of the bluebloods slowly gave way to the hivestems and compound hives of the green and yellow bloods, slightly more comfortable but still unsettling. They were just as run down, just as empty, and instead of spanning for acres about them, they were all quite close together and towered metres and metres up in the air over them instead.

A few stems had actually _collapsed_ , falling in on themselves or breaking due to erosion and taking out a neighbouring compound or two with them. The rubble lay entirely undisturbed, silent and unmoving as the pair of Cancers made their way past, avoiding casting so much as too long a stare at anything.

Karkat was leading them, although he didn't really realise it. The Signless never put up any sort of complaints, though, so who was he to care? He _did_ know exactly where they were headed, though; to the site of where Karkat's lawnring had once stood.

What was he, a home-oriented featherbeast? Jesus.

They'd already made this trek before- _twice_ , in fact- and neither time had ended very nicely. The moment they'd reached their destination (and come to the realisation that Karkat's old hive _wasn't there_ ) the smaller troll had once again broken down. There wasn't really any use in stopping it.

He didn't have anything to hide from anyone anymore.

The Signless had crouched beside him and lay a strong, clawed hand on his back, rubbing soothing circles between the points of his shoulder blades as he sobbed with red tears staining light tracks down his cheeks. Face in his hands, he'd knelt there for a long time- but time was no longer an issue. They had all the time in Paradox Space, here.

They were just passing into the lawnring circuit however, when two pairs of ears flicked up at a faint noise. There was a pathetic whimper, and yellow eyes began darting around suspiciously, hair beginning to stand on end and his form growing tense. He'd never encountered anything in this Dream Bubble beyond his new best (only) friend, and it was an unwelcome surprise.

His elder, however, kept a steady arm over his shoulders as candy red made a more thorough search of the area from where the pair of them had stopped walking. Crouching under the fence of one of the hives in the lawnring was a white creature, ears flat back with a sharp flash of red in its side.

Karkat hesitated as the Signless turned to make his way toward it, standing his ground for a few seconds before falling behind him and following him up to the curious creature. It looked like some very weak and feeble version of a barkbeast, tail curled between his legs. The red was flowing from what must have been some sort of bullet wound on its shoulder, congealing and gumming together white fur and staining it.

"It's an Earth creature," Karkat offered as the Signless dropped to his knees to inspect the wound. Gloved hands with bare fingers danced over the sticky fur around the wound curiously and the dog whined through clenched jaws, drawing its head back. This creature wasn't hostile at all; he proved this by giving the poor dog a gentle pat on the head.

"No idea what the little pus hoarder's doing here. Looks pretty fucked." He paused thoughtfully as his ancestor looked back at him, confused. "Let's kill it."

"That's not necessary, jackass. Try using your fucking thinkpan once in a while before you speak." At least the Signless was beginning to catch on- he'd been so very fucking mild-mannered when Karkat had first met him. He held a hand out and the dog licked it, before nuzzling its maw against his palm. He smiled.

His hand travelled down as he petted the dog's fur, before finding a collar tied tight loosely around the beast's neck. He ducked his head and squinted a little at the small dangling pendant clipped to the collar, but he couldn't make out the strange etchings.

"You say this is an Earth beast? Decipher this shitty cluckbeast scratching for me."

The younger troll rolled his eyes and knelt down, shoving his elder's hand out of the way and looking at it himself. The dog whined quietly at the rough exchange and tried to back up, but Karkat let a quiet growl rumble from deep in his throat. The dog stayed put.

"It says 'Halley', nookbandit. It's not fucking rocket science," he snapped, before the thought came to him that not every single troll he'd ever encountered had had the ‘pleasure’ of communicating with those ridiculous aliens. Oh. Right. But his ancestor just gave him a tired smile and got to his feet, rolling his shoulders and earning a crack from his spine. "If we're not going to kill it, the fuck are we going to do with it?"

"We'll take it back with us. We'll find something to do with the poor creature."

And with that he slid strong arms under Halley's torso, hefting him up in something of a bridal carry. The dog whined quietly under his breath, letting his jaw rest against his upper arm; Karkat watched for a few moments before reaching up and touching the barkbeast's face gently.

A pink tongue darted out and licked his palm, and the creature's long, bushy tail started wagging slowly to and fro as the sufferer began to walk. Karkat swore and wiped his hand on his shirt, before falling into step behind his friend.

"Better be fucking worth it, bulgeshiner."


End file.
